Quake-ravaged Morocco declares three days of national mourning

RABAT - Morocco declared three days of national mourning following the deadly 6.8 magnitude earthquake.

The national flag will be flown at half staff throughout the country, the royal court said in a statement released on Saturday evening, a day after the quake.

King Mohammed VI ordered the army to urgently deploy rescue teams to provide affected areas with clean drinking water, food supplies, tents and blankets as well as a field hospital, it added.

Rescuers dug through rubble for survivors in collapsed houses in remote mountain villages of Morocco on Saturday, in the wake of the country's deadliest earthquake for more than six decades, which killed more than 1,000 people and left many homeless.

The quake that struck in Morocco's High Atlas mountains late on Friday night damaged historic buildings in Marrakech - the nearest city to the epicentre - while most of the fatalities were reported in mountainous areas to the south.

The Interior Ministry said 1,037 people had been killed and another 672 injured by the quake, gauged by the US Geological Survey at a magnitude of 6.8 with an epicentre some 72 km (45 miles) southwest of Marrakech.